The Office Workplace of the Future, What’s in Store for US?

Monday, March 14, 2016

The familiar workplace that we all know is in for some incredible changes over the next few years. How do we know? Technology is leading the charge together with the fact that the Boomers are leaving the workplace and the younger generation’s numbers are getting larger. The millennials have grown up in a different age, with a new set of rules that create different demands.

From my perspective alone, as a modern office furniture provider, I can see the contemporary office design demand increasing. Businesses want to look and feel more in the now, even if they currently don’t have the technology in place to support their vision. In my mind this movement is indicative of forward thinking.

Experts, with their eyes and ears closer to the ground in terms of business development, are predicting a rapid growth in the way offices perform over its current form of operations and thinking in the next five years. Peter Hirst, associate dean of executive education at MIT predicts; the future of office function will be extremely technology-based insofar as it not being surprising to find workers wearing communication devices. Although these devices won’t match the capabilities of basic tools, it will provide more convenience and flexibility. Your Office in 2020.

"Globalization has affected much of the way business functions today, and as it grows it will continue to affect how business works", Hirst says. Countries with much lower cost of production will force companies to get more efficient and modernized in order to maintain a competitive edge. Companies most likely to succeed in the future are the ones that embrace this new technology/modern business lifestyle.

The result of everything that is happening around us will force workers and companies alike to become more knowledgeable, therefore providing advancement and growth opportunities for its workers. Being in a more knowledge-based arena, workers with knowledge, and companies that provide it, will be what be what both will be seeking.

"Companies with less knowledge will be seeking workers with better skillset even if they have to go outside of office domain to get it. Workers with greater skillset will become more in demand", so says Brandon Atkinson, Chief People Officer at AppNexus.

It is apparent that big changes are headed our way in the future. At 90 Degree Office Furniture we feel that a modern office environment speaks to, in a large way, the mindset that companies and workers need to prepare themselves for the future of business.